There is, moreover, "evidence to indicate that the sectarian violence in the NAs, in particular at Gilgit, is being planned and orchestrated from other Pakistani provinces, especially the North West Frontier Province." Very significant quantities of weapons have also been seized in Gilgit-Baltistan, and are shipped in from the neighbouring provinces, even as "the tactics used by sectarian terrorists in places like Quetta, Karachi, Islamabad, Lahore, and elsewhere are now being employed in the Northern Areas."
As the Nicholson Report clearly noted, moreover, the entire Gilgit-Baltistan region remains mired in extreme poverty and backwardness, with a pervasive absence of most basic amenities. Even the Kashmir Affairs and Northern Areas (KANA) Ministry, which is charged with the development of the region, conceded, in the late 1990s, that the ‘Northern Areas’ "have been neglected for the last 50 years… (and) still rank in the most backward areas of the country."
In late August 2005, a 10-member group from the HRCP visited the Northern Areas to assess the level of social services and infrastructure in the region. The mission was fiercely critical of the inadequate structures of governance, the appalling justice system, and the paucity of social services available to the people of the region.
An index of regional backwardness can be found in the Education sector. While current data for the region remains unavailable, in 1998/99 the overall literacy rate in the Northern Areas was estimated to be 33 per cent – substantially below the national rate of 54 per cent. There were significant disparities between the male and female population: the estimated literacy rate for males was 40 per cent, whereas the estimate for females was only 25 per cent.